william-james88 wrote:Black Hat wrote:A lot of Beast Wars was really nicely done. Lots of gorgeous airbrush work that really made the spectacular sculpted detail pop. Terragator is a good example with that wonderfully painted shell. Also Jawbreaker and his Universe redeco Frostbite.
Terragator is an excellent example! Your right about the shell, they really give it an organic feel with the layers of paint.
Aye, a pity the robot mode is so...awkward, because the beast mode looks great. It really feels like a damn shame that we're not likely to get that kind of paintjob in a mainline retail series again.
Anyway, less moaning and more gushing.
(Disclaimer: I don't own most of these figures.)
As you mentioned, most of the RID line had superb paintjobs. Side Burn with his gorgeous fully painted car exterior, Gigatron's illustrious deco, Sky-Byte full stop...And though it might not fully count as most of it was done with plastic colours (AFAIK, don't own the toy) Scourge is a thing of beauty, especially with that chromed up tanker trailer.
Some more Beast Wars goodness came with the Transmetals- TM Waspinator (both versions) is gorgeous, and I've expressed my adoration for the aesthetic perfection that is TM2 Blackarachnia before. Tigerhawk is rocking a pretty sweet deco, as is his nemesis TM2 Megatron (and especially the Cryotek redeco).
Beast Machines had some pretty sweet paintjobs actually. A lot of the Maximals looked really striking, and some of the Vehicons looked pretty good too. Jetstorm's shiny blue coat is a thing of beauty, and Blastcharge, whilst an appalling toy in robot mode, has a pretty neat looking vehicle mode.
(In case you're wondering, yes, I have a major weakness for chrome and airbrushing.)
Sadly the Unicron Trilogy was fairly light on especially gorgeous paintjobs. Armada, whilst replete with some really nifty
designs, and even some good-looking bricks, had very few really standout
paintjobs. Energon faired a bit better, with Tidal Wave's nifty lightning bolt patterns and a lot of the Deceticons in general. Cybertron had two standouts- Galvatron with his lovely (and tough) silver paint and Scourge, with his colour-fades and overall awesome colour scheme.
The Movie lines have had a few nice decos. Most Optimus Prime figures that actually tried to replicate his onscreen appearance with some degree of accuracy usually look good, with the red and orange fade and the overall metallic tint to the colours. The premium decos are always beautiful but that's to be expected.
Animated largely used plastic colours, and to be fair it mostly worked. The Japanese versions, whilst wildly inaccurate, did have some really nice looking shiny paintjobs, so there's that.
I only own one MP (G2 Sideswipe) but he's a real winner. There's something about an "automotive" quality paintjob on a toy that just makes it that bit nicer. They could have gone with bare black plastic, but they went the extra mile and gave him gorgeous glossy black paint. And I love it. Tracks looks nice too with his candy blue paintjob.
G1 Shockwave, IIRC, has a really really nice purple metallic finish (though that might just be plastic). Shockwave is one of those G1 toys I'd love to own some day. Shame he's ridiculously expensive nowadays (AFAIK).
And finally, to round it off on a surprise entry...G2 Bumblebee! Not the MP, the original teeny tiny toy! I really wish the MP had been given the same gold chrome finish- the metallic is nice, but the chrome on the G2 toy just looks luscious.
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